Where's the bit.net support for modding comunity?

Well, this is not a RANT... It's just a complain.

I am a member of BT since 04, and was dragged here because it was back them the best place for casemodding comunity. Lots of tutos, lots of projects....

Then time has passed, more and more the articles of reviews, games and such were taking place were once was a site full of nice ideas.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think the reviews should leave for good. I, for one, LOVE the reviews! And this site is my main reference for games! But I really miss some support for modding. I mean, once per month I read some article on MotM or some other great mod in the front page. Where are the nice tutos that teach us how to make a nice "knight rider" HDD led activity circuit board? The paint tutos? The PWN fan controls?

All we have now is some enthusiasts forum threads with such. The last time i saw a nice tuto on modding was the "modular font" from darth invader more than a year ago!

Well, I really miss the old BT :/

EDIT:
================================
For the nostalgic ones in search for something more instructive, check Bit-Tech.net front pages back in 2005:

Jan 05 BT front page
Jan 05 BT articles subsection

For those that agree with us, please add the following to their signature:
"
Bit Tech is more than games and hardware - check out the mods too. Don't let modding die in Bit-Tech.net.
"

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Don't we all

 

i too demand paint tutos

 

+1.

 

It's been a hectic time around here for quite a while - between moving offices and being acquired by Dennis. Iirc there's more support for modding on the way.

 

Hey Felix, where's the support?



Oh. Righto.

 

Yeah I guess it has been a hard time over there. But much time before Dennis, I felt that way. But if some support is on the way. it will be great

@RTT: Does that means that i should not rant over lack of support for the comunity again?

 

The picture posted is that of Felix Dennis.

There was more than a hint of sarcasm in rtt's post.

 

We had this discussion before on BT. Even bounced around some name changes for the front page. Maybe when things do settle down the rest of us besides Games and Hardware reviews might get noticed.

john

 

Well, I have to say as most of the Custom PC lads were into modding and even had modding Blogs/contests going all the time, you should see a lot more growth on that subject as you become more integrated as a community.

 

K, moved the thread to Feedback & suggestions.

I take your point about wanting more modding, but bit has the same issue with CPC - our backgrounds are in hardware and gaming more than modding (in general), and that, coupled with the fact we can't really mod at work (there's no space, the labs is where a lot of people work, can't really do much dremelling in there) means that a mod article takes a lot longer to prepare than a game or hardware review.

That said, we've increased the amount of modding in CPC - we now feature bit's Mod of the Month winner as well as Reader's Drives in the magazine.

We're also training up Antony (one of the CPC writers) to co-ordinate modding along with Rich, and having more people on the job will mean we can do more of it.

 

@Yoda: Oooo i got it Funny picture btw!

@John: I hope so :/

@Jux: I know there are contests all the time. But if you take a look at wayback machine on these cached pages you will understand what i am saying:

Jan 05 BT front page
Jan 05 BT articles subsection

@Iggy2k: The last link have a REALLY nice tuto on how to paint using spray. I learned how to paint with that article!

@Sifter: I had to admit I didn't even knew about CPC. I will take a deep look on it later. Anyway, thanks for the feedback.


Again I want to say i just love BT since I first joined here. In the tutos here, i learned lots of GREAT things. This is the best modding site in the world, and I am proud of being member of its modding comunity for almost 5 years even not winning a single MotM.

Perhaps it is ask too much for the staff to write their own tutos, but you could reward people that write them with a front page for example. Or one million dollars.. that would be grat too...

I'll see if i can write some tuto on anything to help you guys out. If i may, of course

Cheers folks

 

No no, not at all Please ignore me, it was a sarcastic reply

 

Didn't the guy who did most of the modding stuff (Brett Thomas I think) leave?

Having said that I would very much like to see more modding stuff (even just pictures showing what certain products, such as the ac-ryan acrylic and fans, look like would be greatly helpful in planning mods)

 

Yes, Brett's gone, although I don't know how long ago he went.

 

Brett went to concentrate on his work and studies late last year. Antony from CustomPC has mostly taken over it now - we're concentrating on mod of the month and featured mods now

 

I do have to thank you for providing these links, certainly made for a nice night of reading through project logs

 

Yemerich, the amount of modding coverage hasn't changed a great deal, but we can look into some more tutorials - most of them have been done though if I'm frank. What has happened over the years is that we have increased our hardware and games coverage, which means that it looks like we're doing less modding. The budget (which has now been brought in house) remained fairly consistent in the grand scheme of things and now that it is in house, we can focus as much time as is necessary within reason, whereas before it was capped by the amount of budget we had for it.

If I'm honest, the current site design is struggling to cope with the amount of content we generate these days and the version of the site you linked would be horrendous in this day and age - there's simply too much going on and the page would be pretty useless for navigation.

In terms of our support for the modding community, I believe it's very much still there and it's revitalised now that Rich and Antony are working together on it. We gave away the best part of £5,000 worth of kit in the last Mod of the Year competition and without our contacts in the hardware/games industry, that would not be possible.

There are some things with Custom PC magazine that we're working on with respect to modding - Reader's Drives is one such section. In order to qualify for Reader's Drives, you now need to have a project log on bit-tech's forums. If your mod is chosen for Reader's Drives, there's a prize kitty associated with that - the winners are also going to start appearing online too, but it's something we're still fine tuning.

There are a couple of modding projects that are almost finished - we'll be publishing them in due course - and there are more on the way, too. In light of the fact that we can't create the tutorials ourselves in house for the reasons Alex mentioned, maybe there's another way around it - I'm all for listening to (reasonable) suggestions in that respect.

 

I'd say the actual mod coverage is ample (MOTM etc.), but guides/ tutorials are definitely lacking - it's content like this which is going to draw readers in, invoke questions in the forums etc.

I think perhaps it just requires a little more working with modders. I'm sure if you had a chat with someone pretty heavily into the modding business (Paul @ Coolercases for one), they could make a couple of guides along the way.

Just my 2p worth.

 

The thing with tutorials and stuff is that a lot have been done in the forums by members.